


3:07 AM

by cgf_kat



Category: Voltron: Legendary Defender
Genre: Angst, Angst with a Happy Ending, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Fluff, Gen, Panic Attacks, Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder - PTSD
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-06-22
Updated: 2018-06-22
Packaged: 2019-05-27 00:22:19
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,205
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15012617
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/cgf_kat/pseuds/cgf_kat
Summary: A Plance-ish follow up (or deleted scene, rather, since it isn't Shiro's POV) from my oneshot 7 Vargas. Which is also here on A03 if you want to check it out! (This follow-up has been on tumblr for a while, and I'm just now getting around to posting it here; I'm sorry about that.)Takes place the night after Lance comes out of the healing pod, after he and Shiro are rescued from their brief capture on a remote Galra outpost. Pidge and Hunk have stayed with him for the night to keep him company, but Pidge is the one to wake up when he needs someone.Note: you don't necessarily have to have read 7 Vargas to understand this short, but it would give more context.





	3:07 AM

_ Where did I fall asleep this time? _ Pidge wonders.

Her neck and limbs are at odd angles, one arm twisted behind and under her, one of her legs is thrown over something while the other foot feels trapped, and she’s pretty sure that’s a wall against her forehead. But there are walls everywhere; that doesn’t really narrow it down. 

She registers, finally, the softness of a mattress under her, but it doesn’t feel like her own. How she knows that is beyond her. 

Pidge rolls to her back from the awkward position she’s been in on side, prying her arm out from under herself to straighten it and reclaiming her foot from under...something warm. Someone. She feels tentatively with the leg that seems to be thrown over the same person, and the size of the shape tells her it’s Hunk. Then a snore comes from the other end of the bed. Presence of Hunk confirmed. 

Hunk’s legs twisting up near her head, however, aren’t the only warmth under the twisted covers that aren’t even really covering much of anyone. She glances to her left and finds the outline of Lance’s back near the edge of the bed. 

Right. Lance. Lance’s room, Lance’s bed, the we-can’t-leave-Lance-alone-right-now, post-healing-pod hangout session that apparently turned into an unintended sleepover. Lance is the only one in pajamas - the ones he changed into as soon as they got him back to his room after he came out of the pod earlier in the day. Pidge remembers hovering outside for a few minutes once they got here, until Hunk opened the door again to let her in. 

It’s clear none of them necessarily meant to fall asleep. Hunk’s shoes are still on, Pidge’s glasses are still clinging precariously to her face, and Lance’s robe is still cinched loosely around his waist. She can’t really do anything about the robe and she doesn’t want to throw her glasses anywhere - nor does she wants to completely climb over both of them to get out of the bed - but she manages to quietly pry Hunk’s shoes off and leans over Lance’s back to drop them carefully to the floor where her own are scattered.

That’s when she realizes Lance is shivering in his sleep. It’s not much - she wouldn’t have seen it in the dark - but she can feel it for a moment when she brushes against him. 

“Aw Lance…” she sighs, barely audible. 

Pidge drops the shoes and rests a hand on his arm as she settles behind him again, rubbing up and down for a minute or two until the shivering seems to ease off. Satisfied that he’s okay for now, she turns over against the wall and tries to go back to sleep. 

She can’t. Not now that she’s awake. Not now that she’s thinking about what happened to him. The Galra only had him and Shiro for a few vargas on that outpost...but it was enough for them to hurt him. 

Why did hacking their surveillance system have to be so easy compared with actually getting her friends out of there? Not that it had been hard...it just took time. There were a surprising number of personnel and sentries to avoid for such a small outpost, and that made it more difficult. She had no chance of rescuing them outright. She had to sneak back into the secondary control center, hack into their computer to establish a link with her suit computer so she could work remotely, then hightail it out of there to find somewhere better to hide until she could write a program to shut the base down.

Of course she’d wanted to find them - to keep an eye on them until she could get them out. But…

She can’t erase the image of Lance strapped to that table from her mind. She can’t un-hear his screams, or un-feel how much her chest ached when he was sobbing on Shiro’s shoulder afterwards in the cell they shared for those few vargas.

She couldn’t get them out fast enough. And Lance suffered. And Shiro told her over and over while Lance was in the healing pod that none of this was her fault but it still feels like it was. 

If she’d gotten them out of there sooner Lance might not be terrified of being alone right now. He might not have had that look on his face when he asked her and Hunk to stick around after he climbed into bed - the one that meant  _ please don’t leave please don’t leave… _

The sound of heavy breathing derails her thoughts, and Pidge twists onto her back again until she can see Lance. He’s still facing away from her, but this time his shoulders are moving enough that she can tell even in the dimness. She waits just a moment, to see if the breathing will even out, but it doesn’t. Instead it becomes interspersed with the kind of quiet squeaks that can only be caused by barely suppressed sobs. 

“Lance…?” Pidge whispers. She slides closer, trying not to wake Hunk. Another snore tells her there’s no danger of that just yet. 

“Lance, are you awake?” she asks gently. The only answer she gets is a sob and a gasp that he doesn’t try as hard to keep quiet. Her own throat tightens. “Hey…” 

Pidge wiggles a hand under the arm Lance isn’t laying on and tugs gently on the shoulder she hooks, trying to turn him over toward her so she can see his face, but he stays stubborn on his side, resisting her and still facing away. He curls further into himself to boot, and the too-heavy breaths just pick up in speed as his fingers dig into his hair.

“Lance, it’s okay,” Pidge says. It comes out more urgently at first as her chest clenches in fear, before she remembers to keep it gentle. “You’re...you’re okay. You’re safe. You’re safe, Lance…”

A fresh sob forces its way out with a frustrated sound. “I-I...I...I kn - ow…” he gasps. “I just...can’t—” 

“I know, I know…” Pidge wiggles her arm farther through his, and manages to push another arm under and around him.  She holds on as best she can and presses her forehead into the back of his neck, because that’s all she can do. “It’s okay, just breathe...I know it’s hard. Just focus on me, okay? Focus on my voice.”

Trembling hands clasp over her own where she’s twisted them in the front of his pajama shirt, and she talks. She tells him about the projects she’s working on and how the code works and asks him to repeat things back to her. 

“That’s not what I said at all; you’re not paying attention.”

“I don’t kn-know h...how that….stuff... wo - orks...Pidge…” 

She can feel his chest seizing under her fingers as he struggles to calm down and struggles for air. “I know you don’t. That’s why you have to listen.”

“What are y-ou...do...ing…?”

“If you’d pay attention you’d know.” 

Slowly, focusing on the details she’s forcing him to try to remember takes his mind off of whatever he was thinking about, or dreaming out. Eventually he’s mumbling back whatever she says without difficulty breathing, and he isn’t curled up so tight anymore, and he just sounds tired. 

“And then Mario makes Bowser eat the code so he and Peach can escape from the game.”

“Then Mario makes Bowser eat...what??” Lance flattens out onto his back to raise an eyebrow at her in confusion. 

His movement pushes her back and off of him in the process. Pidge sits up as she’s ousted from her position, and smiles down at him. “Hey. There you are.”

His cheeks are still stained with dried and drying tear tracks, and his eyes are puffy and damp clumps of hair stick to his forehead. It’s not exactly the best picture. Pidge doesn’t care, but he seems suddenly keenly aware of it. His cheeks go red and he tries away from her again, but she stops him gently. 

“It’s okay, Lance.”

He lets her stop him, flopping back against his pillow with a shaky sigh. “Sorry,” he whispers, staring at the ceiling.

“I said it’s okay, and I mean it.”

Lance makes a face. 

“I mean it,” Pidge repeats.

Lance lets out a breath and lifts his head just long enough to take in Hunk at the other end of the bed. “You both stayed…”

“Of course we stayed.”

“You didn’t have to…”

“You asked us to, Lance.”

He looks at her, just for a moment, but then his gaze slips to the ceiling and stays there. He seems calm, but there are still fresh tears streaming silently from the corners of his eyes. 

She lays back down beside him, on her back, looking at the ceiling too. Maybe if she’s not staring at him it will help. 

“I…” he says after a moment. He has to stop to clear his throat. “I guess I knew if I was by myself I’d...I’d think.” The last word comes out on a hitched breath. 

“Do you want to talk about anything?” she asks quietly. His breath picks up for a moment. “You don’t have to,” she adds.

His calms again, but he curls into her shoulder and cries softly instead. She lets him, wordlessly stroking a hand through his hair until it tapers off. 

“It’d be great if I could stop doing that,” he sighs, grimacing in frustration against her sleeve. 

“It’s okay…”

“Wh-why can’t I...I mean I just…why...why do I feel like this? I can’t...stop.” 

“Can’t stop feeling like what?”

“Like I’m...broken. Or something…”

Pidge shakes her head automatically. “Stop it, Lance. You’re not broken. You just got back; you can’t expect yourself to just be completely okay.”

His voice drops to barely a whisper, and she is still staring at the ceiling to give him some semblance of privacy as he mumbles into her shoulder. “It  _ hurt _ , Pidge.” His breath catches again. “We’re in the middle of a war! What if it happens again and I can’t do what I did this time? What if I tell them something?” 

He sobs once. “I thought about it...Shiro was wrong. I did think about it. I...I tried to figure out if there was something I could tell them that wouldn’t hurt anybody. Because I couldn’t make something up or I figured they’d know and it would just be worse...but I just...wanted it to stop.”

She has to swallow hard before she can answer. “Lance…anyone would have thought about it.”

“And I almost  _ died  _ once!” He doesn’t seem to be listening to her anymore. “Th-they wouldn’t turn it off and I couldn’t...couldn’t breathe and I thought I was  _ dead _ but I didn’t want Shiro to—” He stops abruptly, pulling in a sharp breath but letting it out more slowly. 

“I...I...sorry, Pidge. I’m sorry. I shouldn’t be telling you all this…”

“You can tell me anything you want to tell, me, Lance. It’s okay; you’re trying to process a lot right now.”

He swallows and settles on his back again, swiping at his cheeks. “How’d you learn that stuff you did?” he asks instead.

“What stuff? Code?” She glances at him briefly, then back to the ceiling because that’s where he’s looking. 

“No...I mean...when you were trying to make me tell you what you said and all.”

“Oh...my mom,” Pidge says. “She did it for me after my dad and my brother disappeared...I’d have episodes like that too. I just...couldn’t breathe. I can’t cook, so she’d recite recipes or something else that wasn’t really my thing and make me repeat it back until I calmed down.”

Lance scoffs quietly. “What else isn’t your thing? You know everything.”

“I do not; shut up.”

Lance chuckles weakly, and it’s quiet for a little while. “We’re gonna find them, you know,” he says. He finds her hand between them on the mattress and squeezes it.

She blinks at the ceiling in surprise at the contact. “Thanks…”

Why is he trying to comfort  _ her _ ? She was supposed to be helping him. But...maybe this does help him. She is starting to realize, the more she gets to know him, that he really is thinking of everyone else a lot of the time. His personality just does a good job of hiding that far too often. 

“You didn’t want Shiro to what?” she asks then. 

“What?”

“What you were saying before you cut yourself off.”

“Oh...nothing.”

She looks at him finally, staring silently until he realizes she’s doing it and sheepishly glances over at her. He sighs and looks away again. 

“I just meant I didn’t want him to think it was his fault...if I...you know...died. They were trying to get him to answer them, I think...when I couldn’t...when I couldn’t breathe.” His hand tightens around hers. “They were using it against him. I just...I think I tried to tell him it was okay?” He blinks back tears. “I-I didn’t want to die but I couldn’t let him blame himself...you know?”

“Yeah…”

She remembers that. She remembers Shiro struggling to get up off his knees but held back by the chain keeping him near the wall, screaming at the druid to stop before he killed Lance. She’d had the sound muted for a while by then because she had to turn it off or she couldn’t focus. But when Shiro panicked and jumped up she turned it back on. 

She was almost ready to burst in there, program ready or no, whether they captured her too or she died for it or not. 

She wasn’t going to let Lance die. 

But he almost did, and her heart is pounding again just thinking about it. 

“Pidge? Pidge...Pidge?”

Lance’s urgent whispering snaps her out of...somewhere, and she realizes she’s now holding his hand in a vice grip in both of hers rather than just one, and she’s curled toward him the way he was curled into her shoulder a few minutes ago. And the way he’s looking at her...

“Sorry,” she breathes.

He knows now. She can see the wheels turning behind his eyes as he scowls at her in concern. “Are you okay?” he asks. “You went all space cadet on me for a minute there...”

He could have died. They could have lost him, and he wouldn’t be here looking at her like that. Caring about her like that. And she can never change what did happen. She can’t go back and write the program faster or make another plan and keep him from going through that. 

She isn’t sure when she starts crying, or when Lance shifts closer to pull her into his chest. He’s still rubbing her back gently when she can focus again.

“How much did you see?” he asks, from above her head. 

He sounds like he isn’t sure he wants to know. Pidge winces against his shirt and presses her forehead farther into his chest.

“Pidge, come on. I’m not stupid; I know you found us somehow.”

She lets out a long breath, stealing herself before she answers. “Finally got into the secondary control room you and Shiro had been targeting maybe two or so vargas after the Galra grabbed you...I patched in and got out. I had a feed after that. The place wasn’t huge..it didn’t take long to find you…”

Lance goes stiff against her, and maybe it’s her imagination but she thinks he seems suddenly colder. “Tell me you didn’t just leave it on…”

Pidge closes her eyes, and there are still tears finding their way down her cheeks; she’s glad he can’t see them with her face hidden against his shirt. “I had to be sure they weren’t going to kill you; I didn’t know you’d be in there almost two vargas—!”

She’s pretty sure the quiet stream of words that comes next is a lot of swearing, but her Spanish has never been that great. “... _ Pidge _ ,” it ends.

“I had the sound off most of the time!” She swallows. “I-I...couldn’t…” She couldn’t listen to him screaming.

More Spanish. Probably more swearing. Oh, yep, that one she recognizes. Definitely swearing. 

“Did your mother raise you with that mouth?” It comes out before she can really think about it. She would do anything right now to keep from hurting him any more. Even give in to his usual level of joke. 

The sob from above her head may be laced with a certain small amount of humor, but it’s still a sob. “It’s not  _ funny, _ Pidge.”

“I’m sorry…I-I don’t...know how to deal with this...”

This time he really does laugh, even though he’s forcing it through the crying. “Join the club.” He groans a frustrated sound like the ones he made earlier, but from deeper in his chest than before.

“You weren’t supposed to see all that,” Lance whispers. “It was bad enough they made Shiro watch it all…are you okay?”

“NO I’m not okay!” she whispers back. 

He huffs, but he seems to appreciate her honesty. “I guess we can be a mess together…” He pulls back suddenly to make her look at him. “Hey. Hey, you know none of that was your fault, right?”

She avoids his gaze, trying to duck back into his chest. 

“Pidge!”

“Shh! You’ll wake up Hunk.”

“He could sleep through a train wreck; trust me, I was his roommate. Pidge…”

More tears on her face. Why won’t they stop? “I should have gotten you out sooner…”

“You’re you, Pidge; I know you did the best you could. If it took that long, it took that long. I didn’t doubt you for a second; I’m the one who told Shiro you’d be coming after us. HE actually thought you’d listen to him.”

She snorts through her tears. “He should know better.” She gasps in surprise when a pair of lips plant themselves firmly on her forehead. 

“I’ll be okay, Pidge,” Lance says. “Thanks to you. And you’ll be okay too. I mean I guess it might take a while, but…”

“Yeah…”

A monumental snore from the other end of the bed interrupts any thought she had after that. She exchanges a glance with Lance, and they’re both giggling before she can overthink it. 

They settle on their backs again, side by side but closer than before. They’re both scrubbing at their faces, and neither of them are breathing quite right, still - the aftershocks of emotion still shuddering through them occasionally. That will pass, too, like the tears that have finally stopped. 

Lance holds a hand across his body flat out at her, after it’s been quiet a while. “So yeah. Messes together, I guess?”

Pidge smiles and reaches to high-five the offered hand gently. Lance smiles back and catches her fingers before they can slip away. 

They fall asleep like that, fingertips linked between them, and if Hunk is raising his eyebrows at them in the morning they pretend not to notice. 

**Author's Note:**

> Thank you so much for reading! I would love to hear what you think. :) Leave a review, feed a writer. ;)


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